I started to lift Calvin up off the ground when the orb touched me for the first time. It felt like the gentle poke of a human finger, but just that little nudge seemed to send a radiating shock through my entire body.

What looked to be a pale white arm flashed in the corner of my eye when I whipped around, but once I was all the way around, there wasn’t a single thing in my horizon. No blue orb, no Roger, no nothing.

I breathed a brief sigh of relief. Maybe my buzzed and chew-high brain had just been fucking with me?

I figured I had no time to ponder the situation with Calvin dying in front of me. I turned back to my younger brother to see him looking about the same color as the haunting orb, pale blue without a sign of life.

Thoughts of Roger still missing haunted me as well, but with Calvin dying right in front of me, I had to push them back for the moment. It certainly seemed something very bad had happened to Roger, but it seemed to me at this point that there was nothing I could do for him, while there was still a chance I could do something for Calvin.